Dear Watchers: an omniversal comic book podcast

Welcome, um, to Dear Watchers in Omniversal comic book podcast, where we do a deep dive into the multiverse.

We are traveling with you through the stories and the worlds that make up an omniverse of fictional realities we all love. And your watchers on this journey are me guido.

Thank you, scum sucking maggot. I'm joining you from this cesspool that is the United States of America, and this is Rob.

Okay, moving right along, because if someone didn't read the episode title, they're going to think you lost it.

I have lost it. But before we get into this week's episode, Gio, what's new in our little section of the multiverse?

Well, the last few weeks we've been on DC's Earth Seven looking at just imagine Stanley for the first time. We'll have more of those coming in. Probably not too long. We'll check out a few more of those issues with they were more fun.

Than you would think they would be. That's actually a lot of fun.

So that was a great two episodes we did on Batman and Wonder Woman, and we have a lot more to go on that Earth. We also keep putting out our Omniversity, um, episodes. We're getting deep into Promethea, and you and I started watching Alan Moore's, BBC maestro storytelling class. So we are going to start discussing that on our episodes of Omniversity as we get into his story.

Yes. Uh, Alan is sitting in, like, an abandoned attic with candles all around him.

Just the way you would want final record spinning.

Exactly.

Arrow cards.

Yes.

Very well.

The way you would want Alan to be doing a master class in a mystical chamber of some sort.

Yeah. And please, right now, to help us out, help us grow in 2023. Our goal, think of two people you want to tell to listen. So while you're listening, think of two people and please spread the word.

Yes. And please also consider joining us on Coffee as a patron so you can access that Prometheia podcast. And also, if you could please take a moment to leave us a review on Apple that really helps other people find our podcast. And if you are joining us for the first time, we have three parts of our story. Origins of the story, what's inspired this other reality? Exploring multiversity. We dive deeper into our alternate universe and pondering possibilities. We examine the impact and what's followed or coming in the future. And with that, Dear Watchers, welcome to episode 80. And let's check out what's happening in the Omniverse with today's alternate universe. And we've just stumbled out of the grind houses of 42nd street and wandered over to the dangerous shadows of Central Park to ask the question, what if the Punisher's family had not been killed in Central Park?

And this is marvel's. Earth 90200. This Earth has been visited only once. And we'll give you a summary of what happens on that Earth when we get to that issue in our segment.

Yes. And Frank castle. The Punisher is a character we've never covered before on, uh, Deer Watchers. So we're going to give you a little bit of a backstory into this character. He was introduced as an antagonist of Spiderman, as an assistant to the Jackal, portrayed as a bloodthirsty vigilante with no qualms about killing anyone. J. Jonah Jameson describes him as the most newsworthy thing to happen to New York since Boss Tweet. I don't know what happened about Spiderman there. But anyway, so after pairing with Spiderman, Captain America, and lots of other characters, the Punisher is given his own miniseries in 1986, followed by a full series in 1987. His character did decline in popularity, and all of his series were canceled in 1995. Since then, he's been revived by many big writers garth Ennis, Matt Fraction, Matt Rosenberg, and at various times, Frank has been either insane, a, uh, Frankenstein monster zombie, he has been given access to all the powers of heaven, he was War Machine for a while, and lots of other crazy stuff. So they really had no idea what to do with this character.

Yes, and we'll see why.

Yes, and perhaps because he's a lot cheaper to do on screen than, say, Spiderman or Thor. He's been portrayed on film and TV lots more than other characters. You might have seen Dolph Lundgrid, Thomas Jean or Ray Stevenson. Play him. And of course, now in kind of MCU or MCU adjacent, he's portrayed by John Bernthal.

Yeah, I don't know if I'd call that MCU, but I guess we'll find out in the coming years.

Exactly.

Constantly rumors that he's coming back. Burnthal. So Franco castiglione as we learned aka the Punisher was created by Jerry Conway, john Romita senior and Ross Andrew for Amazing Spiderman 129 in 1974. Written by Conway drawn by Andrew But Ramita Senior drew the COVID and possibly did some design work. The Punisher was conceived by Conway, who had read The Executioner, a book series that actually came out the same year as Death Wish. So all of those things were converging in popular culture. And in The Executioner book, it's a Vietnam veteran who becomes a serial killer of criminals after a mafia related death of his family. So clear inspiration there. And of course, one of the most distinctive parts of The Punisher, which I'm sure we'll get into, is his costume. Conway talked about doing a little bit of a sketch up with the skull on his lapel. And then, of course, that got developed by Ramita Senior into the full blown huge skull over his chest. And that plays an interesting role in our what if. So we'll definitely be talking about that. And Stan, in one interview in 2011, did say that he did the name The Punisher because he was originally going to be the assassin. And Stan did not think the assassin would be a reasonable name for a comic book.

Character at times.

So he became punisher.

Uh, yes. Dan said he had an earlier character called The Punisher. So that was one of Galactus's robots. So, uh, that's where he said he took the name from. So stand, of course, finding his way to have some input, whether m he really did or not, into this character.

Yeah. So a lot more we'll talk about, I think with Franco Castiglioni's direction. I think if we called him that, he'd lose some of his mysticism. By the way, like, Frank Castle is such a hard name. It's like, no, let's call Franco Castiglione. That'll, uh, soften him up a bit. So yeah, that's our background for him before we dive deeper.

Yes. And so this is our first time covering this character on the podcast Magico. What is your background with Frank Castle, aka the Punisher?

No. Aka franco Castigito. Uh, as a primarily Marvel reader over many years, I've always known him very well. He shows up in many major events. Not most definitely not all. I never read his title. I never read his introduction into the universe, uh, until Matthew Rosenberg, and that was three, four years ago now. I was hearing really good stuff about that run. I like the artist Simon Kaczynski, and I heard good stuff about Rosenberg's run. So I read it. It was fine. It was better than I thought it would be. But it's still very crime oriented, of course, which is never my thing in a story. And then I got some of the Jason Aron issues, which we'll talk a lot more about, but didn't stick with it, the ongoing that's happening right now. So seeing, um, the movies, seen the first series of the TV show, it's actually the only Marvel property that we never finished. We watched the first series, never watched the second series.

Gosh, I forgot there was even the second series of that. Actually, you just said it.

I, uh, always think about it because I'm like, wow, it really is unique in that we skipped it. But, uh, yeah, that's it. So I know more than, I think, the people who ride around with him on their bumper stickers, but I am not an expert and certainly not a fan. What was your background with Franco Castiglione?

Yeah, like so many of the characters that we talk about on this podcast, like Thor, I knew his back story even without ever having read him. I know that his family was killed because of some mob thing and that he was a Marine. Ah. And that then he took up being.

This find out more about that.

Exactly. So I knew all that, but I had never read him. I don't think, being that my main introduction to so many of these characters were the animated series growing up. I think he probably popped up on the Spiderman animated Series, I'd have to guess. But I'm sure in a very different tone down, he has a Saturday cameo.

In the X Men animated.

Yes, I remember that. Uh, um, and you have to tone down, of course, this character for a Saturday morning cartoon. And I never read his comics. I never saw the Dolph Lundgren movie, which I'm guessing is very loosely based. It definitely seems like it would have been a movie that was playing on WPIX in New York when I was growing up, but I never watched it. I probably have seen the Thomas Jane John Travolta movie, but I don't really remember it. The one Punisher War Zone with Ray Stevenson as the Punisher is really fun. I actually reading a few years ago. Yeah. I'd made me really want to go back and rewatch it directed by a woman. Dominic west is jigsaw and he's completely insane. I'd really want to go back and watch those. And yeah, the John Bernhall series was fine. It definitely is not something not top of my Marvel watching. And that's pretty much my background with this character. And like you said, driving around, especially in upstate New York, you see the dreaded logo bumper sticker often in red, white and blue or something like that on a or black and blue or black and blue on a lot of cars. And I know Jerry Conway, the creator, has a lot to have said about that, which I'm sure we'll touch on also.

Yeah. So let's dive into his origin.

Yes, let's go fly a kite in Central Park. Watch out, there might be Mafia behind that bush. Its origins of the story. Right now on this very show, you're going to get the answer to all your questions. Our amazing story begins a few years ago. And we are not discussing his first ever appearance because there's not really an origin story in that. But we are going to be discussing Marvel preview volume one, issue number two from August 1975. And that is called death sentence.

It's written by Jerry Conway just a year, less than a year from his debut penciled by Tony Zeniga, who did the inks. Colorist is black and white, so there's no color. So that's not a name. Letters are Annette Kawecki and it's edited by Marvelman, Lenwine and Archie Goodwin because it's the magazine format. Marvel. So there's then interviews and other features in it. Of course, most of his appearances following his debut and return in Amazing Spiderman are magazine format because those were not subject to the comics code. So they could include more of the violence that was a part of his character. So, as you mentioned, we read this. We did read his first appearance along with this. But this has the first appearance of Maria Castle and the kids and the origin.

And in his Spiderman appearance, you don't even find out his real name. He simply called the punisher. You don't quite know any of his backstory. I think they might mention that he was a Marine or a soldier. But that's about it. So this definitely goes in much greater detail.

Yeah. So I guess start with generally. I mean, it's very hard to separate. This is one of the harder times, I think, because he has such a cultural presence. I find it really tricky to separate my reaction to this character and to try to engage the story, uh, which normally I feel like I can do well. So that's my preface to this. So it's hard to start with like, well, what did you think? But let's start with, well, what'd you think? What did you think?

Well, um, you're probably going to disagree with me on this one, but I actually really enjoyed this a lot. I love 70s thrillers in the vein of kind of all the President's Men. Crime, crime, crime, spoilitation. Is that a genre?

Uh, if not, I think we should call I think we just coined it. And I think this is it. And I knew you'd like it because.

It'S in New York, dog Day Afternoon, Surpaco, Prince of the City, all those kind of things. So it definitely has that feel a lot here. And it is kind of a weird who done it, but then mixed with a little James Bond kind of in the climax. And yeah, he's just one of those kind of figures where you don't know much. I mean, he's stoic throughout. So he's not the quippy kind of figure of a Spider Man.

He does have wait, there's a moment. I'm going to see if I can find real quick. There's a moment where they say he's talking all grungy to the guy, of course. And he's like, and just because I'm your friend, I'll even add a tip. And the guy says, yeah, what kind of tip? And he says, stop smoking.

Yes.

So there is a little bit of humor in his appearances here. Um, but zooming out. It was interesting to read these two issues together. I'm really intrigued by his origin in terms of the writing and Jerry Conway and stuff, because knowing nothing about him in Spider Man, but knowing that he was inspired by Death Wish and the executioner of this book. And with basically his origin story in The Amazing Spiderman, he is a lot more comic bookie. I still don't like him. But it's interesting because he's going after Spiderman because at this point, people think Spiderman has killed Norman Osborne. And because the Daily Bugle paints Spiderman as a villain, he's going after him and the Jackal sort of manipulating Punisher. So he's very cartoony and comic bookie in that way. I mean, he still kills and he still has his revenge.

But a lot of his weapons in The Amazing Spiderman are more comic booky. So he shoots Spiderman with a wire gun that traps him, and then he's got like a big mortar gun or something. He does have bullets, but a lot of them are those more comic booky Weapons, while here in this next appearance, as you said, just like a year later, it's just gun, gun, gun, bullets and that kind of thing.

Yeah. So it's interesting. I don't know if he was really popular in Spider Man and that gave the green light to this, or if the plan was always to have this more adult story available in the Marvel preview book. Uh, I really don't know. But it's interesting to me because they are very different and yet so closely together and by the same writer. So I'm just intrigued by that aspect of it. But yes, I did not like it. I didn't hate it as much as I thought I would. Including the Marvel preview stuff, in part because it is black and white. And I think it helps it feel.

Like it does gives it a noir.

Reading, something of that time. Yeah.

Um, and it's got a sketchiness to it. It almost feels like it's someone's, maybe because there's no coloring. And even the inking, I don't know how much inking it is, it almost feels like you're looking at someone's sketchbook rather than the final product. There's a rough hewn quality to it that I think helps elevate it. In this case.

Well, in the shadows, it creates a lot of cool shadow and it does look really great, especially on the yellowed page, which these were newsprint, um, page magazines. So the pages are yellowed and that gives it a really cool effect.

Mhm.

The other thing I noticed about it is it starts off right away with War Journal entry number three six two. So again, right away, Jerry Conway has this sense of this way you can tell stories with this character because of course, War Journal becomes a huge part of him. I guess that's a War thing that I'm just not familiar with. But he has a whole title in the 90s during his boom, punisher War Journal, where each one is like a story pulled from his War Journal. So it's interesting to me how many developed aspects of him there are here.

I was wondering if do you think that Alan Moore was in a way, parodying or Satirizing or maybe just paying homage to The Punisher with RoarShack and the Journals. And both of the characters are very serious and kind of speak in this very 70s, like you're a maggot and your scum and all those kind of things.

I think it's a type I don't know where the direct influence was because of course, RoarShack is based on the question. So I don't know if question books.

But the question didn't have that personality style. Right.

He might have. I mean, especially there's some big 80s runs of him where he's much more crime alley oriented. So yeah, I can't say for sure. Uh, but this was definitely part of a type that was being pestiched in there.

Yeah, I almost wonder. It's also thinking of then Rorshack and then reading this, there's times, like the cigarettes line, which I think is supposed to be a funny line, but then there's a few other times, too, where for me, it was a little hard to tell. Does Jerry Conway mean this seriously, or is there a little bit of a tongue in cheek moment here? And the one moment I mean, it's an awful moment, but I laughed out loud is like there's this woman who's yelling at him because she thinks that the Punisher killed her husband. And she's just screaming at him like, Murderer. And then he just slaps her, which is like, um, not obviously her hitting this woman. But at the same time, it seems so incongruous to kind of what's happening. I was almost wondering, wait, is this supposed to be like a commentary on this character?

Well, I do I think it had to be. I mean, especially if it was another writer. I'd question if it was the writer's own misogyny. And perhaps Jerry Conway has some misogyny, but he did create Ms. Marvel and write her for many years. Uh, and I tend to like Jerry Conway's politics quite a bit. So my sense is it was about the character. He's really positioning the character as the jerk. Yeah, he has this great don't like this character. We can tell good stories with him, but don't like him.

He has this great moment where he ends up at the big, bads house. And the big, bads house is basically James Mason's mansion from north by Northwest. And the villain is basically James Mason. Right. He's this industrialist. And in fact, there are all these industrialists trying to overthrow the government. So there's actually this kind of anticapitalist commentary that's kind of subtle and running through underneath it. But he sees Frank sees his big mansion here, and he says he spent a good portion of the money on his mansion overlooking Chicago, one of those glass and steel monstrosities people build today instead of houses. So he sees him commenting on, um, this guy's architecture, which is just also one of those things where it does seem like it's almost satire. Like Frank frank just wants someone's like a white picket fence house, and that's what he wants.

And he has lots of commentary on Chicago in here. I don't know. Uh uh well enough to know. He talks about how Chicago feels like the frontier. New York is this way, and La is this way, but Chicago feels like the frontier. So I don't know. Uh, now, in terms of the origin, just to get into that real quick before we move on, because that's what is altered in the what if it's a dreadedly dark?

Yes, it is.

Um, I mean, there is no question about it. It is this happy family. Now, in this telling, I'm sure it's been altered as they deepen this. But in this telling, it's the day he gets back. Right. It's the first day he slept, not in a sleeping bag. So he is literally just returned and is with his wife and two children in the park. When they watch this, or they see this execution in progress, and the criminals then fire upon them, and his wife and two children are killed.

Yeah. And I couldn't help but think about Bruce Wayne's origin story, where there's sometimes an element of, oh, the Waynes should have just given the given Joe Chill the money, or Joe Chill's gun goes off accidentally, and it's kind of all shown in shadow, and the pearls are falling on the ground here. It's just like they're just killing the children. There's not a subtlety to it. There's not, oh, there was a mistake here. It's just, like, pretty brutal.

Yeah. No, it is. Yeah. They don't give them the chance to walk away. Nothing. I mean, they literally just shoot them. So it is horrendous. It is definitely a refrigerated woman, though. We don't even know her. I don't even know if we know her name at this point, though. We later alert, and it's Maria. So, yeah, really dark, intense, but well known origin. So I'm ready to find out what happens if we change it.

Okay, so let's jump on the IRT line and travel over the New York subway reference for everyone and travel into exploring multiversity.

Uh, I am your guide through these vast new realities. Follow me and ponder the question what if?

And today we are discussing what if? Volume two, issue number ten from February 1990.

This is written by Doug Murray. Pencilled by Rick Levins. Inked by Bob McLeod colored by Tom Vincent lettered by Phil Felix edited by Craig Anderson. So this is early on in the second volume of What If, though incorrectly listed as volume one online because they used an ellipses and the first volume didn't, but volume two and a little bit on the creators. So Doug Murray had just done the Nom for Marvel for about four years, a sort of odd title that I've never read, never heard of that just telling stories from the Vietnam War. So it's the Nom, the Apostrophe Nam M, and it ran for, like, 80 issues. So Doug Murray spent four years writing that he is a Vietnam veteran and then transitions to this and a little bit of other Marvel work. He also wrote, you'd be interested in this for Monster Times Magazine. Big part of his career. Rick Levins, the pencillor on this. This is his first work for Marvel. And then he actually did Grew and Wald's Cap. So he goes on to do a lot of Grew and Wald's, Captain America run and then some creator owned invaliant stuff after this and passed away pretty young. And then Bob McLeod, the inker, just got an exclamation from me because he's, of course, the co creator of the New Mutants and, uh, just a big 80s Marvel artist who's still around and still doing great work, mostly inking, often penciling to lots of cool work. So that's the background on this issue.

And this issue is asking the question, what if the Punisher's family had not been killed in Central Park? Although the COVID question is, what if the Punisher's family hadn't been killed? This is Earth 90200.

Yeah. Not to be confused with 9210, right?

If only the Punisher was in roughly Beverly Hills. 9210. That's the crossover I want to see.

Yeah, but no, the Earth number is the usual designation for those longtime listeners know that it has to do with the date. And so this is February 1990s. So that's how we get the Earth number here. So a quick summary of this issue. We see Frank Castle and his family out in the park, but they narrowly avoid seeing the execution happen. So Frank is trying to figure out what to do with his life now that he's home from the war, and he becomes a cop. But of course, as a cop, he discovers that there are other dirty cops, there are judges being bribed, there's all sorts of criminal activity. He starts collecting evidence for the, I guess, commissioner, the Captain or whatever, thinking that, uh, he's working for good. Of course, the Captain is also dirty. Meanwhile, his son dresses up as a homemade superhero for Halloween and calls himself Captain Punisher, inspired by Captain America, he wears all black with a skull on his chest and carries a gun. We can talk more about that. And, uh, then the criminals are, uh, attacking the Castle house because he has the evidence. In the middle of the night, they kill his family and a house guest he has that night. So they think Frank Castle is dead. But Castle survives because of the porcelain wall in his bathroom, which is strange detail, but it is what happens. And then he starts killing the dirty people one by one, kind of as a sniper. And he gets first called the angel of Death by the newspaper, and then he sends the newspaper all of the evidence that he has so that they can see that actually what he's doing is good, it's not bad. Kingpin owns one of the newspapers and ends up being kind of a nemesis for him. But he ends up confronting finally the Captain, who was the head of it all, who doesn't realize he's alive, kills him and takes the name the Punisher. And that ends our alternate Earth. So, uh, what did you think? All narrated by Watson, I should add, but go ahead.

Yes, I enjoyed this in that it is definitely a super classic what if story that we've discussed many times on here, where there is that one inciting moment that changes everything, but then ultimately, the character ends up where we always know them just in a different route. And that's kind of a, uh, what if that we've seen many ways. And I think we've often also kind of compared it to the Twilight Zone and I think Uwatu is in full Rod Sterling mode in his first appearance there. And the whole story, that kind of classic Twilight Zone storytelling where oh, the character takes different direction, but ultimately fate is almost inevitable. Destiny cannot be all has to die.

And he has to become the Punisher. I think though, what doesn't work is even some of the other, and we've talked about the Status Quo resetting what ifs um, and the way that's a version of it. But I feel like in a lot of the ones we've explored and a lot of the ones that are out there, the alternate path does something different that's really interesting or brings in other characters at least. So even if you end back at status quo, you had this very different journey. This is not that this is the exact same story, just under slightly different conditions. Like there's nothing about this story that is at all distinct from his actual origin. Nothing.

Well perhaps you're saying that too, because so what happens here in this Earth is that the Punisher's little boy's kite gets stuck on a bush. And right behind that bush is where the mafia executions are happening. But they're able to get the kite off the bush without seeing anything and then go on their merry way and they're not killed there. But maybe to what you're saying is it's not that Frank takes a different route. It's not that he sees the murder and decides I'm going to ignore it. And that's what gets him, gets his family not killed, it's just that he doesn't see it. So it's, it's never the most actionable.

Choice everything though, even when so then, I mean the only difference is he becomes a cop for a minute, but then same deal. When his family gets killed, like that's it, they just get killed. They uh, get killed by a criminal organization, right? They don't get killed accidentally. They don't get killed another way. They don't, two of them don't die while one lives. Right? Like nothing about it varies. They get murdered by a criminal organization while he's there, same thing. And then he just becomes a Punisher and starts killing criminals. Same thing. Nothing about it differs.

Uh, I think what does differ, and maybe they didn't go into this as much, is that he becomes a cop and he does think that he can change the system from within. So in the Frank that we know in the six one six, he's not trying to change the system from within. He's just this merciless vigilante. But here he is trying to cop. He's trying to do the right thing. He's talking to his captain, he's trying to go through the procedures that he should, but he doesn't know that the whole system is corrupt. So maybe that's what the story they're trying to tell is. He's trying to do. It the way you're supposed to, and then he still failed.

Well, what's interesting about that you pointing that out is it's making me realize that in his origin and I'm sure again, this is added later on, but in his origin, as it's first presented, and we just read it, it doesn't explain why he feels he needs to work out of the system. So the fact that a bunch of criminals in the park have killed his family doesn't explain why he then thinks he can't just work with the police or something like that.

Yeah.

Uh, whereas this issue does give that explanation upfront. So I guess that's a little different.

Yes.

Even the fact that he ends in the same costume, like, I wanted him to end in a slightly different costume, but he ends in the exact same costume. So it is a full on status quo reset earth mhm mhm.

He does not become captain punisher like his son.

No. That would have been a difference. Right. At least let him call himself captain punisher, but no. Or angel of death. Right. Let him keep the name angel of death instead of punisher.

Yeah. And, uh, definitely still, even though, like you said, we don't even really know his family's names in his origin issue here, his family is still definitely to the sideline. They are not the face of this story. I especially feel bad for kind of this random cousin character that looks like Frank mustache, who ends up literally on the worst night possible to crash on.

Their cabing over her. It is very convenient. I loved the art. I loved the art. Uh, it's really classic stuff to me. And a lot of it, I think, is MacLeod's inking. Him cloud's inking is so tight. It reads like a really, really strong kurt Swan bronze age superman. It just has beautiful lines and looks so comic bookie, but the expressions and he actually does remind me of Clark Kent as I'm skimming through.

He does he does look like funny.

Yeah. But I loved Rick Levin's work on this and Bob McLeod's inks over it, and I really liked it a lot.

Just real quick, just what? It's 1990. Um, many, many years since 1975. But I know you said previously he was a magazine character a long time because they couldn't show the violence. I mean, then he got his own series in the late 80s. But here, especially when he starts killing people, it's violent. And his family, when they get gunned down again, it's pretty brutal. So what had everything with the code, I guess just lessened by this point that you could show this.

Yeah, the code was sort of starting to become more neutered at this point. They're still putting the seal on, but it's loosening. I mean, obviously, culture and society standards around violence in particular have loosened a great deal. And so it's loosening at this point. And then yeah, it'll exist for a few more years before the judges is.

Clearly at a house of prostitution with these sex workers, which, again, for a comic, that's kind of for children is pretty interesting. And then he walks outside and then he just gets gunned down by Frank. It is pretty striking for a comic book. Still in my yeah.

Uh, and when the police officer giving the eulogy his shot, like, the blood.

On his chest as falling over, it's a very cinematic kind of scene where he's falling over and he's clutching this American flag on what is supposed to be Frank's Cook coffin, and he's pulling it off of the coffin. And all the other police officers are running around definitely right away, like, we went back, we were talking about 70s crying movies. Right away, it feels like a 70s crying movie. Frank Serpeco, the actual person who was also, um, in the film depiction, is mentioned in this. So I feel like the artists must have been pulling from some of those cinematic influences from decades earlier.

Yeah. So this Earth, as I mentioned before, we move on from this Earth to explore more of Franco castiglione. This Earth has never been revisited. It's never been depicted even briefly in the background of something. I mean, again, you probably really couldn't because it just looks like our Earth, but do you want to go back to this Earth?

No, uh, it doesn't matter, because as you say, it doesn't matter. It's all set in the same spot. Earth.

Yeah. It's such a slight revision from the 6116 that I don't think there's any need to go back to this Earth at all. All right, ready?

Okay. Let's get that kite out of the tree and go into our pondering possibilities.

Watch out. That's not thunder.

Will the future you describe be averted? So, Gito, what are we talking about for our pondering possibilities?

Well, I forgot to tell our listeners at the beginning of this episode that this is the first episode you've ever constructed.

Of course, I choose the violent 70s character that you hate.

I know.

Yes. That's, of course, the one I choose.

You did you snuck this one in. Um, again, I revised a few things. So I'll answer this question that you can jump in. What you did is you went and found a few points where it looked like Maria Castle had come back. There was one earlier than this, but I read it, and it's the Red Hood or the Hood. I don't remember what he is in the market.

It's just the hood. Yeah.

Um, he, uh, resurrects or is about to resurrect Maria Castle. She's, like, crawling out of the coffin via magic. And Frank has someone torch them because he doesn't want them resurrected. So it doesn't really count. Uh, and then we landed on this issue because this is the current run, and she is actually resurrected in this. And so it gives us a chance to sort of imagine what if his family was alive? And we can talk more about how that works.

Because what's the phrase where people have said that the one rule at Marvel for a long time was you couldn't bring back Uncle Ben or Bucky Barnes. And then, of course, they brought back Bucky Barnes and probably Uncle Ben at some time. But I feel like you could bring okay, he's never mung back. But I feel like you could add in Maria Castle into that because her death is the whole reason the Woman in Refrigerator moment of why Frank becomes who he is. So, yeah, this is Punisher volume 13, issue number one from May 2022. And this is the King of Killers. Book one, chapter One the Blessings of War. And we also read issue number two of this series as well.

And I actually skimmed through the current issue, which, when we're recording nine, is about to come out because this is the 2022 Big major reboot, getting a lot of attention for reasons we'll talk about. Written by Jason Aaron pencilled by Jesus siege with Paul Azaketa uh, inked by Jesus and Paul colored by David Stewart lettered by Corey Petit edited by Martin Bureau Analysis Bisa and Tom revort And again, we read it because Maria Castle is back in this run. And this is, of course, the run now that has done away with his previous logo. He has a new emblem because he's an agent of the Hand. So in this issue, which I guess we already spoiled it, but it is eight months old, so that's fine. He is an agent of the Hand. And through flashbacks, we learn that the Hand has approached him and manipulated him to become their fist. Because it's a pretty cool construction, I think.

Uh.

The person who leads the Hand says that he is the best killer there ever was. And to reinvigorate the Hand to make the Hand a force to be reckoned with again, they need him leading them because he is the best killer. Now, the only reason he agrees to it is they bring him back Maria Castle. And the rule that he forces them is that they will only kill the people he tells them they're allowed to kill. And there's one scene in this first issue where there are, I think they're called rapist, child abusers, something else, and he kills them.

The Hand can no longer train and basically steal babies.

To be correct, he tells them they can't do that. And now Maria is back. She has lots of bullet wound scars and she does not remember anything. She's a little confused. She does not know that the children are dead yet. Let's talk more. I mean, what do you think of this? And then I can share more of what happens in the issues that are more recent that I saw with Murray.

I like this a lot. I'm a sucker for cult stories and black magic and occult and a little bit of ninja, samurai, kind of all that kind of stuff. So this definitely crams all of those things in here where we have this black magic story and lots of violence. Again, speaking of what we were just talking about violence and the other issue, this one takes it. I was surprised that they're able to show this in comics today.

I almost feel like on that note, I almost feel like Aaron was trying to make sure that it wasn't accused of going soft, which I'm okay with. I didn't mind it either. Uh, especially because what he does a really good job is like, he's fighting the Hand. At one point, you see him. That's when he's still using guns. So it's a flashback. So you get to see him use guns. He's killing all of the Hand, so who cares? They're like, whatever mystical things. No one cares that much. He's killing all the warriors of Aries and they're using, like, these souped up weapons. And they might even be mystical, too. And he's killing them with swords. So, yeah, there is a lot of blood and violence, but it's always constructed in a way with the exception of that scene where he just slaughters people who are rapists and child abusers.

Oh, yeah. He just, um, cuts off all of their heads and we don't really know are they really guilty? We're not really told anything about them.

And he's like, Bring me more. That's weird. But, yeah, part of me felt like Aaron was trying to make sure that it felt like a hardcore Punisher story because he was doing a lot of reconstructing of the Punisher for probably a lot of political reasons.

Yeah, this one, Servant of Aries here gets throwing stars in each of his eyeballs. And then Frank has, like, the other throwing stars, like a brass knuckle that he's punching him with. So it's pretty gruesome. It is. What did you think of this new revamp of this character? And then we should also talk about some of the things that are different with this Frank as well.

Yeah, I mean, before we get into the larger part of that, the story wise, uh, it pulled me in. I liked it. I don't always love that level of violence, but it's an interesting story to tell, especially with his relationship to the Hand now and this question of Maria. So what happens, uh, in a few issues, and I guess this is a little more spoiler because we're getting closer to Current. But again, nothing major from the last few months of Puncture comics. At one point, he tries to leave the Hand Citadel with her, but she ends up dying again. And the Mistress of the Hand, whatever her name is, she says, like, you can't leave. She'll die if you leave, so you have to stay here. So that keeps him trapped. We also find out that he has her trying to recreate his children. And she talks about it's harder with children when they've been dead so long, and they keep coming back like a little mutated. And he actually has to kill those mutates. So there's some interesting stuff with the origin and what's going to happen. Maria keeps asking, when are the children coming home through to the current issue. She doesn't know. So far that I read. She doesn't know that she was murdered, and she doesn't know that the children are dead. So it's an interesting story to be telling. It being named Book One. It's clear aaron usually, uh, with most of his writing, he has this huge arc at play, so it could take years. But he's building something and he knows where he's going.

And her depiction, maria is very striking because she's not a zombie or anything like that. But she has all these bullet holes. And the first time we see her at the end of issue one and then at the beginning of issue two, she's in bed with Frank. He's got these scars that of course, have come from his own battle. So there's this nice contrast or companions between his scars from battle, her scars from being killed, and that she does have all these bullet holes over her that have kind of healed over. So it's very interesting because first when I heard, oh, she came back, I figured, oh, she just came back, just, uh, as he remembered her. So it's such an interesting idea. And I think, um, it actually improves it that she still has these elements of her death that are a part of her.

Yeah, well, it's a mystical resurrection. So it's going to have like the monkey's paw quality. Ah, it's not just a comic book resurrection. It's a mystical one. I also like, in terms of the series, this isn't so related to what we've been talking about, but I like the flashback shifts to his childhood. I, uh, like the art a lot in those. And it's fun. It happens in every single issue. There's something some issues actually. The majority of the pages are flashbacks that are telling stories of his first kill as a child. Telling stories of the Hand actually having approached him. But he never realized that when he was a child. Looking at the influence of Captain America on him as a child, which is, uh, one connection to the what if, actually.

Yes, totally. Yeah. I like also that it's giving him a sense of where the famous skull moniker came from, where he's with the principal or the guidance counselor in the flashbacks. And he's got all these notebooks where he sketched. And a lot of them is him sketching the famous skull. So it makes sense. Oh, this is something that a kid would sketch out on his notepads. And one has the name Dark Shot. Maybe that was like a superhero or vigilante he was creating, but naming it dark shot. And then yeah, the connection to Captain America, which we then see with Frank's own kid in the what if, it's just very interesting. And it also is interesting because it shows, oh, it wasn't just Vietnam. It wasn't just the murder of his family by the Mafia. There was something serial killer esque that was building in Frank since he was a little kid.

Yeah. And that's where the flashbacks are cool. They're adding more depth to him as a character. And with that logo, of course, uh, we can get into that in a second, but it goes on in the, uh, other issues because we see flashbacks of his meeting Maria, and he's on the hockey team, and they're the Devils. And so there's this devil face on his shirt. And that actually becomes the inspiration for this revised logo. The reason he's revised it, even though it also fits into the hand and this sort of devil hand imagery, he's actually pulled that logo out of the meeting of Maria that he's remembering and his being on the hockey team. And there's a cool page where they're all wearing the Devils on his shirt. And in his flashback, he sees it and he has a new logo on his shirt as the hockey player. So it's interesting that Aaron is doing that now. I was reading a lot of the background on this series, and there are really great quotes from Aaron and from someone I am not a fan of, but has some good quotes here. CB. Sibulski, the editor in chief of Marvel, because obviously the Punisher, as we've talked about, is, uh, the icon and the imagery have been co opted by everything ranging from Blue Lives Matter, police support, through to anti gun control, pro gun people through to actual Nazis, neo Nazis, fascists people who went into the Capitol on January 6. So it's such a controversial image. And I think they knew rebooting him also in a society where guns are such a huge issue, and the promotion of gun use and gun violence is very concerning when you have such mass shootings. That was the intention here, you suspect. But Aaron actually says, like, Marvel did not give him a mandate to do away with, uh, the logo or anything like that, that when he was considering what to do, he thought about how so many groups this is a quote have tried to appropriate the punisher symbol and write their own story of what that symbol means to match whatever their agenda. But they don't get to define the story of this character. It's the character Frank Castle, I'm interested in. His story has always been a dark, twisted tragedy about a man consumed by war, for better or for worse, no matter what short sort of shirt he wears. And that's exactly the kind of story that we're telling here. And so he apparently had this story developing for years. It was not necessarily the product of recent events. I don't know if that's true or press release stuff, but he does just say that it was not something that marvel had required him to do in this, and he was just really interested that frank is more than just a symbol. He's more than the weapon in his hand. The story is about who he is in a broader sense and how he fights this war. That's the history and mythology behind it. And then CB had said at the time, this relaunch, the punisher is not a hero or a role model, a fact that's reinforced in the pages of our books. For readers who unpack frank's character, there's a deep and compelling story about how his demons drive him to do terrible things that heroes would never do. And when you think about his story in that context, it directly contradicts how the punisher has been appropriated. So I appreciate that they speak with such clarity about the character.

And jerry conway, the co creator, has also said similar things, right?

Yeah, I mean, he's interesting. We even if you remember in his campaign a year or two ago where he took the logo and made black lives matters merchandise. Uh, we have one of those shirts. They were very cool art pieces that he did to try to this was before the new logo design had been revealed. So he was just trying to coopt and take back that logo because the logo has been employed by by so many hateful or violent groups and individuals. You see that too. You see it with trans co opting of the logo. I've seen online there's some cool campaigns to try to do that, but of course, now it seems like marvel just won't use that logo anymore. Now in these books, they do flashback, obviously, and show him with it. And what's cool is a few issues after this, aries actually wears his old symbol to antagonize him and to try to fight with him. So they're not ignoring its existence by any means. But I think they're doing a good job of trying to move away from it.

Yeah. And the new logo, it's not like they're changing it that much. It's still a skull. It's still creepy to what we were saying earlier. He's still killing people very violently. So what is at the heart of the character has not changed whatsoever.

Yeah, I think that's what's clear to me in this aaron run and in all of the stories that we read today, is what I don't like about the character is actually not what the big current issue with the character is. So I think you could choose either issue with the character being that his logo has been co opted by hateful, violent people and that he employs guns all the time. Uh, my issue with him is that he kills people and doesn't kill, like, not in a cartoony superhero way. He's not killing some Archville and he's not killing nameless Hydra agents, right in that scene in issue one, he's killing these people. And like you said, who's determining their guilt? And I'm not a supporter of the death penalty, so I wouldn't be supportive.

Which Frank does say the capital punishment should come back in. Uh, I think it's the what if where he's like, we should bring back capital punishment.

That's why his child names himself Captain Punishment.

Yes, exactly.

Capital punishment. He takes those words. But I'm okay with that existing as long as he's never glorified. But I'll never be a big fan of a character that kills people. I've never seen the Death Wish movies, and I never will.

Sure. Yeah. I do think I do wonder, kind of going back to what we were saying earlier, if in some of this, there is supposed to be satire, which, of course, has been lost on the people that have co opted. But even when he says, should capital punishment come back, it almost could be read as a funny line. It's hard. You have to read. And also in this Jason Aaron issue, like the moment I love is in the flashback when the hand attacks him and then he opens up his refrigerator and he's just got knives in his refrigerator, but he also has a cardin of Chinese food and looks like a card in milk and maybe like some cold cream or there's a little thing there. But it's all, uh, those little moments in some of the lines that we talked about earlier, like the smoking line stops smoking. Even though he's killing all these people. I do think that there's some level of commentary of this black, dark humor that's kind of underneath all of it that is telling you, yes, he's killing people, but you are supposed to not read this totally just on the level. There is something supposed to be, on the surface, that I think all of these writers, or at least the smart writers, are doing with this character.

Yeah, I think you can read them for sure as, like, a Red Skull. The Red Skull is never supposed to inspire someone to want to be a Nazi. Um, and so I think it's fine that the Red Skull exists. I guess the Red Skull is so squarely a villain. And I think what's tricky is that for decades, the Punisher became so popular that they made him on the side of heroes, even if he's an Antihero, blah, blah, blah. Marvel did regardless of what CB is saying today, which I appreciate, marvel did construct him as a hero for decades so that they could sell more of his books.

And there's a big difference between him and a character that actually kind ah of looks has a very similar outfit, which is Venom, um, who's also a villain antihero, but Venom's eating people, right. And, like, has webs and stuff like that. So it's like, oh, it's different he's not a war hero, quote unquote, and he's not shown always in a heroic light. So, yeah, I think the sense of realism about Frank is the tricky part, which is why I think they do offset it with the occultness or even going back to the Marvel preview that ultimately the villains have some giant laser gun. They're trying to always bring it a little bit back to the comic bookness about it all, which is what the Punisher War Zone movie does so well. And maybe the Netflix series didn't do as well, which is like with the War Zone movie, it's like, okay, we're just going to show people's blimps flying everywhere and it's not going to be realistic at all.

Yeah, and I think, uh, I was thinking about that, too. Like, why am I okay with that movie, but less okay with the way the book was written. Uh, at least in the some of it, I think, has to do with the quote we saw from Jerry Conway earlier when we were doing some research, where he had constructed this to be a one off B level character to introduce the jackal through. And so I think the challenge becomes in the serialized storytelling of a character like this, a movie fine, that's not serialized, but as soon as you try to write month after month a story that's moving this character along, it becomes really tricky. Which is why, as you mentioned in your intro, I think they struggled with how to deal with this character. They made him franken Castle. They had him have these powers, become that person, do this? Uh, he's a hard character to deal with. So I think that's part of the challenge is the serialized thing. So before we leave and wrap up, is there anything you think the what if inspired about Aaron's Run?

I don't know if it officially inspired, but I think going back to what we were saying earlier about Maria's, uh, death is so important to the character. Just like Bucky Barnes or Uncle Ben, maybe they did look back to the what if and go, oh, what makes this character what makes this character stand out? Uh, and it's the death of his wife and his family. So I don't know if it directly inspired, but maybe it did. And certainly the Captain America stuff, which, I mean, they're both war heroes, so there's lots of other connections between them as well.

I agree. I agree with that. All right, well, that has been a wrap or is a rap. That's been our episode. Deer Watchers. Thank you for listening.

I have been Gito and you dastardly punks. I have been Rob.

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